Some History shows up, you blink you might not see it. Today I was cleaning up the trainroom storing old MRs and I see the cover photo on MR August 1972. That is the same car I have moved in regular ops on the LDRR in Tempe, AZ over the years. I would of never noticed, but David pointed out A.B.T.X. 10011 on a layout visit. Not for being on the cover of MR, but for being copyed by Athearn #5275 50' Plug Door Box Abbott Laboratories #10008
A.B.T.X. 10011 is still in operation over 45 years if not more. Talk about History smacking you in the face, and not know it.
Video clip about the car at 13m 24s https://youtu.be/U76T0pDnh-I?t=13m24s
AzBaja
Ed Ravenscroft whose layout is on that August '72 cover worked for Abbott Labs in an executive position before he retired to Phoenix. He was also NMRA President more than once.
Dave Nelson
I have access to a few things from Ed's Layout. I have looked at the original fisheye phot used to make the cover on MR. I have used/operated that same roundhouse in that cover and one day would like to reproduce that photo and try to get the updated version of it on the cover of MR. I just do not have access to a fisheye camera or lens. I wonder how many old layouts have parts or equipmnet still in use. Just the small parts left from EDs layout is lots of fun finding them show up in early MRs
That was a great issue.
Jim
E.G. and Bob,
Thanks for reminding me about one of my famous "lost issues." I'd been in the hobby only a couple of years and scraping up a whole $7 for a yearly MR subscription would have put a big gap in the RR budget, so I was still sticking to buying at the LHS or on the newstand monthly (60 cent cover price.) That worked pretty well in the civilized parts of southern Indiana when we lived in Bloomington, as I was a regular visitor to the LHS. Then dad finished his MBA and we were off for Germany...
The Stars and Stripes bookstore then became my supplier, just down the hill from my high school, so I could make daily visits when it was due and make sure I got my copy. Then my brother and I spent summers back in Monon-land at my aunt and uncle's farm. 12/hrs day, 6.5 days/week, all summer long, for a net of $600 -- you do the math, but it was my only income since I'd just turned 16 and jobs took some wrangling in Germany because the US govt was the employer of first and last resort for mil brats there.
Only problem? We were out in the sticks -- with no supplier of MR! Thus I was guaranteed to miss July and August issues...and I did in 72 and 73.
And I see I missed a lot in this issue, starting with the cover story and a report on Allen McClelland's sweat-soaked, non-ACed session on "card-order operation" at the NMRA. Things were just starting to get going with such high-concept ideas about what the hobby's goals should be.
Dang! Walthers new Monon coaches are only $8.95 and I didn't get 3 or 4 -- wish I'd known, but that's what happens when you missed an issue back then. Might have bought them instead of the cool leather fringe coat I still have...but the fit is pretty tight, good thing I could only find it in "big." The coat sits in the closet, but I could still be putting miles on those coaches now that I have a sweet Atlas Monon #502 to pull them -- and no coaches. Such is the pain of being an old model railroader, tinged with regret from not pulling the trigger on something when they could have.
Then there's Bob Brown's letter seeking info on High Boutell's pioneering narriwgauge models, a search which readers of the Gazette (itself several years off in the future) know was rewarded and documented for our pleasure there. I would have recognized Bob's name from his award-winning On2 Maine modules as seen in MR in 67-ish. And there's lots of NG product appearing every month (I was into HOn30 a la Frary and Hayden then.)
Then there's topic ripped from the headlines right in this Forum right now, a letter complaining that no extra weight was needed in the new O Atlas boxcars as called for in a recent review to get them up to NMRA weight.
The first micro-motors are reviewed from Rail Craft in St. Louis, a staple of NG needs over the next few years.
Speaking of the familiar, the "At the Throttle" is all about modeling on a budget, because scribed wood was $2 a SF -- dang, wish I could find me some of that. LHW ends by an appeal for more Dollar Model Project submissions, an idea that was starting to price itself out of its market.
The review of NMRA Gold Award winners in MR over the years shows some well-known and not so. Notable is the 68 winner by Wm Albertson of UP turbine 1. Some 1250 pieces and took 4 years to build. And you thought ScaleTrains.com took too long to deliver???
Turbine's were hot then, too, because another scratchbuilt one appears in Trackside Photos, UP 30 by Bill Melis, who built his in a relatively rapid 230 hours.
The there was the Digitrack 1600, a new command control system, with systems starting at $339.95...is this the beginnings of Digitrax or just another evolutionary deadend with a similar name?
Great little prototype and trackplan traction article on the Philadelphia & Western.
Finally, the back cover, a virtual province of PFM at that times, instead has an ad promoting the then very fresh Cumbres & Toltec as a corporate donation to the effort to preserve narrowgauge.
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
Thanks, Did not go that deep into the issue this time. Just spotted the same car on the cover that I have operated on a layout. Wish I had a fish eye lens to reproduce the fish eye cover of the round house.
If you like at page 43 you will see the Station at Hillside Juntion in a photo from April 1971. If you look to the right you will see Hillside Juntion still in use today. https://youtu.be/FLkPucPFhpA?t=11m59s
Most regular freight cars in real life don't last that long!